


Did You Know

by Goanna_Blue



Category: Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Eventual Romance, F/M, Family Loss, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Main character is unintentionally named after a car., Maybe - Freeform, Post-Bumblebee (Movie 2018), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Ratchet is such a dad, References to Genocide, Robot Violence???, Size Difference, Slow Burn, Sticky Sexual Interfacing, Transformer Sparklings, Transformers Spark Bonds, Violence, War, War Crimes, knightverse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:15:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26655031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goanna_Blue/pseuds/Goanna_Blue
Summary: It wasn't that she seemed small, but rather weighed down. As if in her mind she had placed the entire outcome of the war on her shoulders, and he was watching her collapse under the weight of their loss.He would give anything to convince her to share the load.
Relationships: Optimus Prime/Original Female Character(s), Optimus Prime/Reader
Comments: 6
Kudos: 35





	1. Mission Status

**Author's Note:**

> Hkhgksfgvhrjhf hi. I'm super new to the Transformers fandom (like I accidentally watched part of AoE in June and then proceeded to watch all of the live action movies, followed by TFP and Siege) and I have all of these ideas for fics bouncing around in my head so I was like "fuck it, I'll just post one of them." so yeah. This was originally intended to be an x reader but it's kind taken on more of an x OC dynamic at this point, meaning the main char has a name and set appearance (that I MIGHT try and draw at some point). As of right now, chapters from the perspective of our main gal will have you/yours pronouns and chapters from other perspectives will use she/her. Seriously seriously seriously tell me if you don't like that or want me to change it or whatever. This takes place after the Bumblebee movie bc Knightverse Optimus??? Is??? Amazing??? Step on me??? And I love him so I was like "Imma give him a wife" I'm drawing inspiration from lots of different Transformers media overall, so if things get inconsistent or confusing or whatever just tell me. Please keep in mind that I intend pretty much everything in the tags to happen eventually (hint hint), so if those are not the tropes etc. that you enjoy then you may have to be ready to stop reading at some point. Lots of headcanons, OCs, and all that jazz, enjoy!!!

“My liege…” It was astonishing how quickly a frown creased his faceplates at those words. Coming from literally any other bot on this cursed ship, that phrase normally sent the ghost of a smile across his face. Instead, his mood instantly soured at the sound of the grating, all-too-familiar voice.

“To what do I owe the pleasure, my dear Starscream?” Megatron asked, voice all but oozing with irritation.

“I- er… was informed that you would be having… M06 respond to the potential Autobot threat?” Said guest asked, seeming surprised by the amount of immediate disdain with which his leader had responded.

“That is correct.” he replied, willing the conversation to cease then and there and refusing to give him the grace of optic contact.

“May I… inquire as to the reason behind this decision?” The larger bot heaved a large ex-vent, wondering for perhaps the thousandth time if anyone would notice a spontaneous disappearance of the treacherous mech.

“The _reason_ behind this decision, shockingly, is that I’m electing _not_ to take your fraudulent claim seriously, and allowing a guest who has overstayed her welcome to prove herself useful.”

“‘Guest’ meaning brainwashed prisoner?”

“Don’t you high-ground me, seeker. If I recall correctly, it was _you_ who dragged her half-dead chassis onto this ship with slightly _less than pure_ motives, was it not?” Megatron clarified, finally turning to see the bane of his existence standing all-too-comfortably in the entrance to the control room.

“At least I didn’t ask Shockwave to commit mass femicide in a fit of rage.” 

“I advise that you choose your next words wisely.” He warned, less than pleased that his second in command _still_ couldn’t see how much it had truly benefited them in the long run, despite the effects having been… grander than anticipated. He stuttered for a moment, keen to each one of his leader’s threats even after all these years.

“Are you really willing to sacrifice one of the few femmes we’ve managed to preserve?” The seeker asked incredulously after a moment of careful silence, “what if they kill her?” Megatron couldn’t help but roll his optics. He really wanted him off the ship, didn’t he?

“If you’re so confident that Optimus Prime is really down there, then why don’t _you_ go scope it out, mm?” the larger mech asked, turning back to the ancient scripts he was trying to decipher. Trying and _failing_ now that a certain distracting someone had already made his presence a nuisance. “I’m giving her a test run, Starscream. She’s been taking up space and resources for too long, now.”

“And you don’t even plan to use her for her original purpose.” He elected to ignore the seeker’s deadpan, irritatingly insubordinate tone.

“I can manufacture pre-programmed soldiers at will that mature at a fraction of the rate of a naturally conceived sparkling,” he replied calmly, “so no, our rare find is of no use to me other than fodder.” _That, and I don’t know why in Primus’ name we would still need prisoners from the fall of Iacon_.

“I suppose that’s why you let Shockwave use her for his little passion project?”

“Yes, and why she is the _only_ resource I will be allocating to this ‘signal’ you insist you detected that Soundwave somehow _didn’t_.” He added pointedly, taking a significant amount of satisfaction from the way the smaller mech shrunk in on himself. Though he couldn’t help but recall fondly Shockwave’s surprise upon bringing the spirited femme out of stasis. 

The scientist had very nearly lost his only optic, and, in an odd combination of psychotic excitement and mortal terror, immediately requested to forfeit their original plans for her in favor of something a little more… complex. The Decepticon leader almost found himself hoping she _would_ be the first to encounter the supposed missing Autobots; the damage she could cause under her new protocols would be entertaining at the very least.

“Besides,” he grumbled, making a dismissive gesture, “I’ve got other things to attend to, things that _don’t_ involve a miserable organic-dominated planet named after dirt.”

\---------

**872 years earlier**

**Iacon, front lines**

You thought it would be enough. Somehow, you really did. Though looking back now it seemed ridiculous, childish even.

You’d laugh at yourself if you could, you really would.

You thought the anger would be enough, the vengeance you craved, deep in your spark. You thought that picturing his face would make up for your complete and utter lack of experience on the battlefield. That a pedigree full of soldiers you had never met would lend you confidence in the midst of chaos. That instinct would hide the fact that you were barely considered an adult. 

You thought you could win this war, and you were very… very wrong.

You had made your way to the front lines, fighting alongside the finest warriors of the Autobot resistance. But it wouldn’t matter in the end, not really. It didn’t matter that you had offlined two dozen seekers, or saved the life of a big red mech whose name you didn’t catch. It didn’t matter that you had held your own for more than five orns of war.

Because Iacon was gone. It had to be.

Details were hard to pick out among the mess of the battlefield, and at certain points you weren’t even sure that you were still at the foot of the capital that you had arrived to defend. But if there was one thing you could recollect, it was the sky disappearing in a swath of black, soldiers literally stopping mid-fire to stare in horror. The Nemesis had arrived, and with it, nearly the entirety of the Decepticon army. 

You had barely cried out the order to _fall back_ when a bullet obliterated your backstrut.

Your legs gave out immediately, body hitting the ground with an absurd amount of force, face first into the spray of energon that had erupted from your chassis. Bolts of pain nearly fried the circuits that hadn’t gone offline below the impact, making it horridly clear that you wouldn’t be getting back up any time soon. You wanted to scream, you wanted to cry out for help, but whatever semblance of consciousness you had left, whatever remnant of a real soldier you had buried somewhere deep in your agony-addled processor told you to keep quiet. That your life depended on it, if it wasn’t already leaking out onto the ground beneath you.

Because chances were, you were the only femme on that battlefield. And chances were, someone would take notice.

And someone did.

You didn’t hear him approach, but you still managed to keep your intake sealed firmly shut when a rough servo turned you over, angry red optics glaring at you through your fading vision. You glared back, cursing your overheated processor for preventing your blaster from manifesting.

“My my my, what do we have here?” he asked, voice grating on your already overwhelmed audial receptors, “might it be a treat for Megatron?” You felt sick, very very sick. This was exactly what he had been trying to prevent, wasn’t it? You weren’t a soldier, not anymore. You were a commodity. 

_I failed_

Before you could muster the motor control to tell him to eat your aft, you were being dragged across the ground by your pede, through the viscera of dead comrades and pools of energon. You couldn’t fight back; you couldn’t move at all. Your arms dragged uselessly behind your helm, and the panic rising in your processor was slowly being dulled by the lure of stasis.

_I failed him_

You heard more voices, or at least you thought you did. It was hard to tell what was real, and what was your imagination. Everything was numb and yet drenched in white-hot agony at the same time. Part of you screamed to stay awake, to fight back _somehow_ , while the other cried out for reprieve, and death started to sound like a perfectly reasonable wish. Except you wouldn't die, no, the universe wouldn’t be that kind. 

_He was killed for nothing_

You had a guess as to what ‘treat’ meant, but every time you thought about it, the unfulfillable urge to purge your tanks overwhelmed you. All of his work to keep you safe, to give you a life beyond the war. He had believed so strongly in the Autobot cause, in Optimus Prime, but he sacrificed it all to save you. To save his daughter.

You had never wanted to scream so badly in your entire life. In your mind you were asking, begging the blurry figures at the edges of your vision to just end it, to kill you before you could hate yourself any more. But you would not be granted such peace, and a large yellow optic was the last thing you saw before darkness consumed your vision.

_I’m sorry_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was that dumb? Is this a dumb concept? I honestly don't know, but hey! Optimus will be in the next one! This chapter was a bit shorter than my usual standard, and I should be updating pretty soon. Tell me what you think!!! I crave opinions.


	2. Estranged

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How could he possibly hope to make things right when he was the very reason that they weren't?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyyyyy I'm back already, and I already changed the title lmao As promised, this chapter is a decent bit longer. This was pretty much my first time writing an action sequence so bear with me. (also @ the first person who commented ILY) I'm in that phase of fic writing where I'm pumping out chapters like no one's business, so... enjoy that while it lasts lol. Enjoy!

**Earth**

**1995**

Guilt. That was the primary emotion that occupied his processor anymore. Gnawing, disconcerting guilt. Over what was a tricky question, as he had lost count of the reasons over time. He blamed himself for starting the war, for letting it go on for so long, for _not winning it_. Guilt was a familiar feeling, one that he accepted.

Because not only was he at the root of the war that doomed his home planet, he found himself with the audacity to feel utterly, and at times painfully at a loss for what to do without it.

He had little excuse to leave their makeshift base, but the Autobot leader found himself growing rather restless as the months wore on. Perhaps eons of war had made him long for conflict, perhaps he felt as though he lacked purpose without it. 

Yes, he felt very guilty, and the relative peace they had found on earth was one he very much felt his comrades deserved, but one he did not yet feel he had earned for himself.

But it was a peace that was about to be stirred.

In the eight years since Cybertron’s fall and his arrival on earth, more than twenty new autobots had arrived, and far be it from him to say that more weren’t coming. In most cases, Optimus or Ratchet were able to contact the earthbound pods, and either adjust their trajectory to a controlled location, or evacuate the projected landing site. 

But this one didn’t ping him before it fell. That, and it crash landed not a quarter mile in front of him.

Everything seemed to happen within the blink of an optic. He had been on his way back to base from a routine outing when the pod hit, giving him perhaps his first real scare in thousands of years. The impact was immense, sending unsuspecting vehicles and chunks of asphalt flying through the air in all directions; a burst of flames illuminating the darkness of the warm west- coast evening.

No sooner had he slammed his brakes to try and assess the situation than a black car had burst from the cloud of smoke and dust. Lurching at a dangerous speed the wrong way through traffic, it pushed unsuspecting commuters out of the way without hesitation, and that was sign enough for him that a fight was coming. Though he did spare a moment to admire the speed at which this arrival had scanned a new alt-mode.

Wheels screeched on the pavement beneath him as he turned at a speed that would make human stomach churn, and a non-sentient big rig topple. The roar of an angry engine coming straight for him at breakneck speed grew louder, as did the honks of angry spectators. On one hand, the intruder having already scanned an earth vehicle decreased the likelihood of any alien rumors floating around, giving Agent Burns a fighting chance to spin this into a believable story as he had done so many times before. But on the other hand, whatever the new arrival had chosen... was very fast, and wouldn’t exactly account for the massive crater gouged into the California highway.

But he would have to worry about that later.

 _.:Optimus to base, Ratchet are you there?:._ He commed as soon as he got his wits about him, .: _we have a confirmed hostile presence en route, I repeat, confirmed hostile presence:._

The car was already on his tail, and it would surely be on _him_ in no time at all. His vehicle mode certainly wasn’t intended for chase, rather endurance, but he needed to get farther away; despite being in the middle of an effective desert, it was a busy road. And chances were people had already gotten hurt. 

_.:This is Ratchet, Optimus are you sure?:._ Static crackled in his audials as he could only assume Ratchet had scrambled to answer the sudden comm. He made to reply when the flare of headlights in his mirrors was suddenly replaced with a glint of red, the telltale clangs of a transformation managing to send a twinge of panic through his processor.

_.:Quite:._

It became very obvious very quickly that the Autobot leader was out of practice, as he was tackled off the road before he could even begin to react. Dust sprayed around him as he tumbled off the road, transforming messily into his default mode as sand flew into his seams. When the distinct skid of a blade was heard, servos prying at his shoulder plating, he returned to his senses in an instant, digging his pedes into the ground and reaching for his assailant, who was currently attached to his backstrut. 

For the amount of force the immense mech was knocked off of the road with, he certainly didn’t expect to be able to huck his opponent as far as he did. The strange bot rolled for a moment, before leaping to charge the prime once again. It was much smaller than him, with pristine black plating and a physique that screamed _warrior_ , but never in a thousand orns had he expected his first Decepticon encounter on this planet to be...

… a femme?

Taking advantage of his momentary distraction, the Decepticon swung towards his legs with a surprising amount of power for her size. Her blade connected dangerously close to his knee joint, and he held back a hiss of pain as he managed to grab hold of the limb that had reached for him. Immediately on contact, she ducked all of her weight straight down, bringing his helm into direct contact with her fist.

Stumbling backwards, he gathered his bearings just in time to catch her by the chassis when she tried to pounce again, slamming her onto the ground with an immense _thud_. A distinct whir filled the air, and before he could block it with his other servo, a stinging blast hit him in the side. Lucky for the seasoned warrior, he was well-practiced in the art of fighting through excruciating pain. Pushing just far enough past his earlier disbelief, he grabbed her blaster, managing to bend the barrel in his grip before she placed a well-aimed kick to his injured knee, rolling out of his grasp and climbing onto his back as he fell.

He immediately rolled forward, the femme jumping off just before being crushed by the much larger mech. Her recovery was sloppier this time, and she faltered for a moment before readying her blade to swing. Taking advantage of his lowered angle and her loss of momentum, he took the chance to swipe at her legs, causing her to crash onto her side. Jumping to his pedes again, he managed to catch her arm mid swipe, dropping a knee onto her back and slamming the blade onto the ground, where it was shattered by a heavy stomp. 

He was about to comm Ratchet and ask for backup when something caught his optic, something that definitely didn't belong.

He could have quite easily mistaken it for part of her plating; it was the same shining black, if it weren’t for the fact that Optimus was very familiar with Shockwave’s neural inhibitor technology. Instinctively he moved to grab for it but her helm flew backwards, very nearly colliding with his own. 

Using the momentum of his reaction, she yanked her arm from his grasp and bucked upwards, the motion yielding just enough power to jostle the prime. In a flurry of movement that he couldn’t hope to replicate himself; she grabbed his leg between her own two pedes and pulled, throwing him onto his side as she twisted underneath him. 

With both weapons out of commission, she didn’t hesitate to use her fists once again, slamming his helm into the dust beneath them, leaving her vulnerable legs directly in Optimus’s line of sight. But pulling her down wasn’t the hard part, as he had learned; it was keeping her there that presented a challenge. 

She didn’t make a sound when her body collided with the earth, nor when he dragged her closer so that he could pin her servos behind her back.

“Who are you?” he asked without thinking, seeking more to break the silence than to get an actual answer.

“I-I-I- designation… fa- _alsified_ , orders… respo- ond.” garbled, staticky cybertronian fell out of her mouth, body going momentarily stiff, as if it took the effort of her entire processor. That was certainly unusual.

When her motor control seemed to return, Optimus was ready. She kicked out one of her pedes, trying to trip him, but all of his hesitation had now gone. A strange shriek escaped her vocalizer when he ripped the device off of the back of her helm; not pain, but perhaps simply protest. A burst of sparks followed his servo as he crushed it, and her body immediately fell limp.

Alarmed, he immediately flipped her onto her backstrut, ducking down to place his finial against her chassis. A thrill of relief went through him at the subtle sound of her pulsing spark, and he let himself fall backwards onto his skid plate, venting hard as all of the prior events finally started to piece together in his battle-hazed processor.

A femme, he really found a femme. Or rather… she had found him.

Her optics were now offline, but her plating still reflected the blue of his own, giving her an almost ethereal appearance. He reached out, suddenly unsure if she was really there, if he hadn’t just concocted this entire outlandish scenario in a fitful recharge caused by this planet’s impure energon deposits.

Placing his servo gingerly against her pristine faceplates, though; he determined that she was indeed here, and she was indeed a she.

And she needed to be brought back to base, he realized, finally thinking to comm Ratchet again.

 _.: -you copy?! Optimus?!:._ He winced at the medic’s panicked volume, realizing he had left him with little to no information on the situation.

 _.:I’m here, I’m here:._ He reassured quickly, pressing a servo to his damaged side, the pain starting to make itself known. _.:I need you to contact Agent Burns and give him my coordinates, I don’t have my trailer:._

 _.:Of course, of course:._ He replied after heaving a nearly comical sigh of relief. _.:...what happened?:._ Optimus looked down at the motionless femme, a myriad of emotions flitting through his processor. _I think a better question, is what happened to_ you _?_

_.:Something quite extraordinary:._

\-------

The makeshift base was quiet when he finally arrived, almost unsettlingly so. But after the audial-full he received from Burns, the silence was welcome.

It wasn’t that he didn’t acknowledge the seriousness of the situation, but rather that there was nothing the Prime could do or could _have_ done to remedy it. The capsule had arrived quickly and without warning; it was either sheer luck or building misfortune that had placed its trajectory directly in his path.

After a thankfully short ride to the warehouse-turned-robot-safe-haven, the first femme on earth besides Arcee was pulled in by Optimus’ alt-mode, contained in a trailer begrudgingly donated by Burns. As soon as the door to the medbay clanged shut behind him, he transformed to his full height; finials narrowly missing the hanging lights suspended from the ceilings.

“Well… that was certainly a turn of events,” said Ratchet as soon as he appeared in the main corridor. It was hard to read the expression on his friend’s face; an odd mixture of hope and apprehension as he approached the crate in which the subdued femme had been transported. “You are certain she is… a she?”

“Feel free to look for yourself, friend.” Optimus offered, moving to unlatch the steel lid that was keeping her out of the medic’s view. His expression didn’t change upon the sight, besides perhaps a slight furrowing of his optical ridge. 

“That... is certainly a femme.” His voice was eerily deadpan, “let me… Primus, let me just- patch you up before I dive into this.” he grumbled, motioning for the larger mech to sit. 

The prime was quite familiar with the routine, sit still, don’t move, let him work, and maybe make some small talk. But conversation was sparse between them as he allowed his medic to make the necessary repairs. Neither knew what her arrival on earth meant, and neither knew what they could possibly say that would address the sheer gravity of its improbability.

“You mentioned a device?” Ratchet asked, finally breaking the silence as he soldered one last fuel line in his leader’s damaged side. He nodded quickly, pulling the destroyed object out of his subspace where he had nearly forgotten it.

“This was attached to her neural port, removing it was the only way I could think to neutralize her.” 

“Well it’s probably a good thing you did. Chances are they can track it, if they haven’t already,” he muttered after taking the contraption, reminding his leader of another possible outcome of today’s events, “and while Shockwave is a brilliant scientist, his programs are complex and require large housing, making them quite inefficient in the long run.” 

“Which is quite fortunate for us, in this case.”

“Yes, I suppose it is.” Ratchet replied, moving away from the blue and red mech to cast yet another odd gaze at the femme; taking a few hesitant steps towards her unmoving form.

“To be perfectly candid I… am unsure of how to feel about this...occurrence,” he confessed, “part of me is quite overjoyed, and yet another is- distressed.” 

“That is understandable,” the medic reassured him, squinting at the femme’s plating, “it feels almost… selfish to be hopeful when we don’t know why or how she came to arrive here.” The prime nodded in agreement.

“I assume we can ascertain that she was not… utilized of her own free will,” Optimus offered, watching the medic inspect her damaged blaster, while testing his still-aching knee joint, “though I wouldn’t necessarily put it past Megatron to use this kind of technology on his own soldiers.”

“Neither would I, although I can’t really imagine a femme aligning with the Decepticons intentionally,” Ratchet pointed out, “which suggests she was either kidnapped or taken prisoner at some point.”

“I am rather inclined to believe the latter; she didn’t exactly make a strong _civilian_ impression on me.”

“In that case there’s a chance I can identify her neural signature; at least on the off chance I’ve ever treated her in the past,” he replied, moving up her body to her helm, reaching out his left servo to run a processor scan, “in fact, she… oh.” his face fell in an instant, almost comically so. 

“What is it?” Asked the bigger mech, resisting the urge to prod at his throbbing side.

“Optimus she…” Ratchet’s expression, nothing short of horrified, grabbed his attention once again, “she’s an Autobot soldier, she-” The medic held a disbelieving servo to his intake. 

“Ratchet?” Optimus, suddenly concerned, and somewhat perplexed. He didn’t move for a moment, grim realization flaring in his optics, before he became a flurry of movement.

“I need to reboot her- I need to- oh _Primus_ what’s happened to you?” The red and white mech was visibly distraught, turning the femme onto her side and prying violently at her neck plating before unsheathing a precision blade from his wrist.

“Ratchet, what’s going on, who is this?” The prime asked urgently, watching him expose the neural port previously occupied by the Decepticon device that had been removed hastily in their battle.

“Maxima,” the name hit him harder than her strike to his helm, “the only sparkling I could save.” Optimus couldn’t help the wave of grief that overcame him, despite the wonder that had accompanied that designation once upon a time. And yet that same _once upon a time_ was so filled with loss, with _disbelief_ at an unprecedented level.

He had known that his former comrade was capable of great cruelty, but no one could have possibly expected Megatron to commit the level of atrocity that he did.

Femicide, plain and simple.

And it wasn’t as if the survival of their species hadn’t already been in danger. With the war lasting thousands of years, resources were spread thin across Cybertron, and less and less sparklings were born each year. And then when the virus arrived, carriers were effectively wiped out, causing a cascade of perishing sparklings in their wake. While many of the mechlings survived, only one femmeling pulled through.

Maxima

After the deadly plague had run its course, only a very small handful of femmes had survived; perhaps no more than a dozen in total. And after years of rumors, the youngest of them had been presumed dead, having disappeared after the fall of Iacon.

But here she was, very much alive, and very much grown.

“...What do you need me to do?” 

“Just… move her to my operating berth, I- I might need you to hold her down when she comes back online, I have no idea how she’ll react.” _I have no idea what she’s been through_ remained unsaid. Optimus nodded, moving to slide his arms under the unconscious bot, electing to ignore how perfectly she fit against his chassis as he laid her across the plain gray examination table.

It made sense now; that kind of ferocity, that skill couldn’t have possibly been engineered by Shockwave. He had never met her in person, but he knew her sire and carrier quite well. They had elected to leave the base to raise their sparkling; a decision he certainly didn’t blame them for, but their absence had certainly been noticed.

He couldn’t help but reflect fondly that Maxima had clearly inherited her mother’s tenacity, and her father’s hardiness. 

There was no shortage of rumors surrounding her; the femmeling who defeated death. Some said she had been hunted down and killed, others believed she had never survived in the first place. Tales were told of a young femme appearing out of nowhere on the front lines, small and tenacious with a talent for grounding seekers. But some also liked to gossip that she had left the Autobots nearly as soon as she’d joined, turning to the Decepticons who had nearly killed her.

It was almost ironic, in a sick, tragic sort of way.

Ratchet’s frantic movements had calmed slightly by the time he used a large gray cord to connect the back of her helm to his carefully engineered, primarily self-built computer. While he liked to complain about the primitive nature of the technology available on earth, he knew Ratchet was relieved to finally have some semblance of the lab he used to occupy; even if Wheeljack tended to use it without his permission.

“I’m going to input a few modules that should help her to adjust,” he stated after a long stretch of silence, digits working swiftly against the expanse of his keyboard, “I just hope none of that Decepticon code ended up embedded.” That didn’t sound comforting.

“Are you certain her memory is still intact?” Optimus asked, not feeling particularly thrilled at the idea of having to endure another brawl with the likes of her. The medic paused his brisk typing, seeming to consider the prime’s words. 

“No, I’m not certain at all,” he admitted, a trace of worry seeping into his voice, “but the sooner we find out, the better.” Optimus nodded, knowing that it rarely faulted him to simply put his trust in his old friend. He had seen him perform miracles more than once; Maxima’s survival being one of them.

The minutes that followed felt more like eons, as Ratchet shifted his attention between the unconscious femme on the berth, and whatever his monitor was reading. Unwavering determination had overtaken desperation on the medic’s faceplates, flipping a nearby switch on second nature that closed the entrance to his makeshift medbay.

“I don’t particularly like the idea of Sideswipe or Bumblebee interrupting should they make an untimely return from… whatever it is they’re doing,” Optimus could almost chuckle at his friend’s gruff quip, if it weren’t for the fact that his servo was hovering precariously over a button that read ‘engage’, “this might be hard to watch, but we need to be ready for whatever happens.” His voice was steady.

“I understand.” He reassured, giving him a firm nod as he braced his servos against the femme’s arms. Ratchet returned the gesture, optics flitting his screen for a moment, checking and rechecking his protocols before a large ex-vent escaped his intake.

“3, 2, 1…”

At first, nothing. A faint whirring emanated from what he could only assume was her processor coming back online, and then...

He swore his spark nearly stopped when her optics finally opened, wide in panic as he was nearly blinded by their blueness.

But he didn’t have the chance to admire them any further, because their appearance was accompanied by the most spark-wrenching scream he had ever heard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's right, baby, we in the 90s. Question. Do y'all thing Knightverse Optimus has a face n stuff under his mask like Bayverse Optimus? Or nah? PS I totally forgot that the Nissan Maxima was a thing when I named her, but oh well. Anywho, her alt-mode is a black 1994 Pontiac Firebird, one of my dream cars. Tell me what you think, don't forget that comments saturate my dopamine receptors!


	3. Backtrack

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She had never thought of herself as a miracle, but she wasn't her father.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pspspsps, I love how I have tons of things that I want to put in these notes and then as soon as I'm ready to post I forget all of it. This chapter was kind of tricky in that there were lots of really specific emotions I wanted to portray, and I'm not really sure if I feel like I did them justice.

_ There was never a bright day in war. No one ever woke up feeling optimistic, feeling giddy about what was to come. No one left recharge early, eager to make the most of their time given. _

_ There  _ were _ no good days, but today, today by all possible accounts was a bad day. In fact, it was the most grim day anyone could remember. _

_ The short-wave broadcasts confirmed it, a virus engineered by the Decepticons had swept over Cybertron. A virus that was designed to target femmes. And it was working. _

_ It almost didn’t seem real. It felt too absurd, like something not even his worst nightmares could hope to concoct. But it was real, very… very real. _

_ And the Decepticons hadn’t left the skies since. He had stayed away from his former base as long as he could bear; as its discovery would only mean more death. But now he had no other choice than to make a mad dash for the hidden settlement. He needed to find help, he needed Ratchet. _

_ The young medic, while he had been nervous and anxious to prove himself when he had first arrived however many vorns ago, was nothing short of gifted. He was intelligent, hardy, and performed well under pressure, making him the perfect combat medic. That also made him the only hope his daughter had for survival. _

_ “Hang on little one, you’ll be just fine.” Backtrack murmured to the sparkling in his grasp, trying desperately not to jostle her in his haste. He felt his spark drop for the millionth time when she didn’t respond, the normally feisty sparkling not even able to muster the energy to chirp back to him. But worse yet, was the sickening feeling of her spark fading in its chamber, he could  _ feel  _ her dying through his parental bond. _

Unfair unfair unfair

_ This wasn’t supposed to happen, she wasn’t supposed to suffer like this. She was a child, she was  _ innocent _. Just a few cycles earlier she had attempted her first scan, and her brand new black plating was already faded and dull, big blue optics just barely online. _

Make it stop make it  **stop**

_ It was horrible to watch it progress, to know exactly what was happening and why, and yet be all but incapable of stopping it. It started with lethargy; instead of screeching for energon she would simply reach out her little servo, and that was before her appetite left her completely. Then came the disorientation, the neural connections in her processor deteriorating and causing her to stumble and flail; costing her the steps she had just learned how to take. _

_ And it had all happened within the span of a cycle. _

_ His pedesteps echoed throughout the base-turned-ghost town, until a white helm with a telltale chevron stopped him in his tracks, the mech immediately beckoning him into the med bay. _

_ “Ratchet she-” _

_ “I know, Optimus commed me,” He acted immediately, extracting the limp sparkling from her sire’s distressed grasp. He had a brief moment of fatherly alarm, having to force down the urge to snatch his bitlet back. “I’m going to need you to step outside.” Lubricants rose to his optics without permission, the sheer unmatched terror finally rising to the surface as he watched the doctor handle his fading offspring. She, like her late carrier, was a small femme, but small wasn’t the word anymore. She looked frail, she looked  _ fragile _. _

_ “Please Ratchet I- I can’t lose her, too.” He didn’t care anymore, he didn’t care who saw him cry. The Decepticons had taken too much from him, from  _ everyone _.  _

_ “I will do my best, Backtrack.” He assured, only looking up briefly before turning back to the little femme. To anyone else, the medic’s voice would have probably sounded deadpan at best. But he recognized this mech’s quiet confidence, his resolve. And when he looked into the younger bot’s optics, alongside grief and exhaustion and devastation, he saw determination. _

_ How many femmes had he watched perish over the past cycle? How many friends, sparkmates, and family members had he been forced to tell? How many times had he felt he had failed? Who had  _ he  _ lost? _

_ “She’s stubborn, and she’s made it this far,”  _ She has a chance _ was all he could hear, “but I need you to step outside so I can work.” And against nearly all of his parental coding, he left the room. _

_ He stood beside that foreboding gray panel that kept the medbay hidden from view, alternating between pacing madly and prying at his own plating. He couldn’t hear anything, so he was left to listen carefully to what he could still perceive of his daughter’s spark. Every time he detected the most miniscule of changes, whether positive or negative, he had to physically restrain himself from breaking through the wall and demanding to know what was happening.  _

_ He knew the risks of having a sparkling during the war, he  _ and _ his sparkmate. Those few perfect cycles they had together as a family were better than he could have ever imagined, and he wouldn’t trade it for anything. But he didn’t think  _ anything _ could compare to the pain of losing Nightreign; the agony of his severed bond paired with the loss of his sparkling’s carrier. It somehow paled in comparison to the idea of losing his daughter, his precious bitlet who reminded him so much of her it was painful at times. _

_ In those days it was hard to look to look at the world around him with anything but despair, even anger. It was a world that didn’t reward his residual desire for normalcy, one that didn’t care how much he craved a real life for his sparkling, whom he loved more than he had ever believed himself capable. It was hard to say that he had hope for any sort of future for her; that she could have friends, or an education, or sparklings of her own one day. _

_ But  _ she _ had given people hope, just by existing. _

_ And, hours later, when the door opened again, and he could still feel Maxima’s faint spark echoing to his own, he let himself hope, if only just a little.  _

\-------

Drowning and dreaming, that was what your existence had teetered between for so long, the feelings blurring together on more than one occasion. Drowning when your mind tried to fight its way back topside, and dreaming when it tired of the endeavor. Awareness was only a rare treat, and one that was often accompanied by an audience.

Those fleeting moments you were allowed to come back online, surrounded by gawking Decepticons, being poked and prodded by a big purple mech, were spent quite literally kicking and screaming. It had only been allowed to happen a handful of times, but you were never put back under without having put at least one dent in the plating of whoever dared to approach, and you were fairly certain you had removed at _ least _ one optic.

There were small bits of peace, too. You would relive memories of your sire, the image of prideful smile, the feeling of his larger, comforting frame. He would tell you stories of Cybertron before the war, of his life with a carrier you didn’t remember. For the longest time he was the only person in your life; and you often resented the isolation. But just your short time as a soldier and a captain had left you longing for the simplicity of that life; the safety.

But you had also lost count of the times that his demise replayed in nightmarish detail, and you found yourself once again wanting more than you’d ever wanted anything to cry, to  _ scream _ . You knew you couldn’t, but you still tried, you tried until it hurt, everything  _ hurt _ .

Awareness became a relative term, but discomfort was definitely something you could identify, alongside the sensation of your body moving without your command, until it would crescendo into agony. The feeling of another force occupying your physical being, of forcing your conscience  _ out _ , was not something you felt you could accurately describe. It was visceral and violating and downright  _ wrong _ . 

Sometimes it would build and retreat, like a processor-ache from not getting enough recharge. But over time, whatever  _ time  _ even meant anymore, it gave up the grace of a slow approach, and never really faded.

It became constant, a constant state of detached agony. Torture. Suspended between red hot pain and smothering darkness.

Until you were drenched in blinding light, returning to your body in a flash as your optics flew open for the first time in Primus knows how long.

Two mechs, one you didn’t quite recognize but were sure you’d met before, and one you were sure you had never met, but certainly recognized all the same.

But it couldn’t have mattered less in that moment who stood before you, not with sensation returning all at once so that the screams could finally escape.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ayy backstory. Sorry it's short, but I wasn't gonna force more than I felt was necessary. Leave a comment if you'd like to provide the serotonin I normally get from entertaining my Dr. Pepper addiction.


	4. Lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A whole new world is opening up, and yet crashing down on her at the same time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: this chapter mentions rape briefly and kind of elaborates on the fear of it.  
> Heyo. Sorry for the wait (I say knowing that the wait will probably get worse). A few quick questions, do y'all prefer past tense or present tense? bc I'm used to writing in past tense but a lot of fics I've read that I really like have been in present tense, so idk, what do you guys prefer? Also, i'm sorry if my tf time units are all messed up, but frankly there doesn't seem to be an end -all-be-all guide for which ones are correct. So ya, for me cycle means week, solar-cycle means day, lunar cycle means month, klik means a second or a few seconds, vorn means decade-ish, orn means several-ish decades, and breem means a few minutes. Of course I say this and I still use human time units occasionally, but I figure they might try and use such units while getting accustomed to a whole new astral cycle etc.  
> Enjoy my garbage

The sound was piercing, shattering even. It only lasted a few kliks in all, but it continued to echo in the confines of his helm long after she had ceased, and he was all but sure that at least half of the camp had to be awake now. He was no stranger to the sounds of screams, but this one hurt him to hear, it hurt not knowing how much  _ she  _ had been hurt.

The moments that followed were tense, weighed down as they waited. Her optics were unfocused, flitting back and forth as she regained consciousness for the first time in who knows how long.

“What is... where--” her optics suddenly focused on him, and he couldn’t possibly hope to decipher the myriad of emotions that raced across her faceplates before settling on terror once again, “get off of me! Get- I can’t--” She pried herself from his grasp, landing on the floor with a surprising amount of grace for her distressed state. 

“Easy soldier...” Optimus murmured, but speaking was apparently the incorrect course of action, as she stumbled backwards from the sound of his voice; and he had to fight back a wave of sadness at the sight.

“Wait wait, hold on, hold-” She clasped both servos against her helm, vents working with audible strain to cool her overheated processor. Her legs very nearly gave out, knees shaking as her senses caught up to her.

Ratchet held up a servo to his leader, expression full of concern as he approached the young femme, watching carefully. Optimus had to fight against his deep-rooted instincts to comfort, clenching his digits at his sides in restraint instead of reaching them out. 

“Where am I?” She asked after what felt like eons, “what… happened?”

“You are at the Autobot base, among friends,” he replied after a nod from the medic, “you are safe.”

“I’m… what?” The black femme looked up at the two mechs, recognition flaring almost violently in her gaze as her optics finally focused, “Oh Primus, you’re-”

“My name is Optimus Prime, but you probably already knew that.” He offered with what he could only hope was comforting humor, and he was sure his spark stuttered in its chamber when she met his gaze with relief instead of fear, a curt, disbelieving laugh escaping her intake.

“Designation Maxima,” she said, a familiar rigidity to her tone as she stood a little straighter, no small amount of power held in her stance, “but you probably knew that, too.” 

“Afraid so.” He replied with a smile hidden beneath his mask, relief washing over him when his words seemed to relax the femme, rather than send her running. 

“Maxima, my name is Ratchet,” said the medic, somehow managing to sound comforting as well as professional, “you might not remember me, but-”

“No I- I remember,” she asserted, a mere fraction of her earlier distress leaking through, “You saved me, when I was a sparkling,” there was a pause, “you knew my sire.”

“Backtrack…” Ratchet took a small step toward her, “Is he-?”

“Dead. Been dead for some time,” Maxima replied quickly, even tone marred by a throb of  _ hurt  _ shaking its way through her EM field. 

Optimus felt a familiar pang of grief; it had been orns since he’d seen Backtrack, having hidden himself away to be with the little family he had risked so much to have. He had guessed that the mech had met his untimely fate when rumors had reached of Maxima appearing on the battlefield alone.

“Can you tell me the last thing you remember?” Ratchet asked quietly, as if he didn’t really want to know the answer.

“Iacon.” Was her curt reply. 

“So you were on the front lines?” Optimus asked. She nodded slowly, suddenly looking much too tired to be standing upright.

“I was a captain,” she muttered, “we got overtaken when the Nemesis arrived. I took a hit to the back, couldn’t run away.” her optics started to flit back and forth again, and she startled slightly when a large blue servo was placed on her shoulder. His spark throbbed painfully as she looked up at him; gaze full of hurt and sadness and something else he couldn’t quite place.

“Do you need to stop?” She shook her head, stubborn determination flaring amongst the despair in her expression.

“I don’t know how long it was later; couldn’t have been too long if I didn’t bleed out, a seeker found me, dragged me to the ship,” Optimus caught a distraught glance from his medic as she continued, “everything after that more or less blurs together; I was in stasis most of the time, but I… I don’t have any idea what they did to me- what their intentions were and I...” She was visibly shaking now, and he could practically see the scenarios she was concocting in her head reflected in her optics.

“Maxima..?”

“Oh Primus what did they do what  _ happened _ -” she looked down at herself in terror, as if looking for something identifiably wrong, as if she hadn’t arrived on earth for the sole purpose of reminding him how little he had sparred in recent cycles. Her venting became rapid, panic evident in her features.

“Maxima- Maxima, listen to me,” the medic’s voice was stern as a servo stopped her mid turn, “nothing is wrong with you, you are safe here, I promise.” Unconvinced only barely described her expression, as she met the medic’s gaze with an anxiety unlike anything he had ever seen, pulling away from his firm grip.

“They took me for a reason, they  _ wanted _ me for something they wanted to--”

“You were used as a soldier, Maxima, nothing more-” He paused before continuing, seeming to come to a grim realization in his processor. He shuttered his optics briefly before bringing them to meet her frightened gaze, vocalizing what neither of the mechs could even understand having to fear in the first place, “you are not sparked.”

Optimus, stunned into stillness, wasn’t sure how to even begin to react to the pure unadulterated  _ relief  _ that radiated from the femme’s EM field as she sank to her knees with a resounding  _ clack _ . Horror may have been closest. He was familiar with the fear of being taken prisoner, of being experimented on and tortured, but she was afraid of being used as a breeder; she was afraid of being  _ raped _ .

“...And I  _ was  _ never-?”

“No, you were not.” She released a sobbed ex-vent, hopefully missing the despair filled glance that the red and white mech gave his leader,  _ I don’t know what to say  _ written all over his faceplates.

She cried gently, the hitch of her vents almost too quiet to hear, and they let her. They let her do whatever she needed to. It may have been seconds, it may have been hours later when her whistling vents had quieted to an acceptable hum, shoulders sunken and optics distant.

“He didn’t want me to join the war, he didn’t want me to be a part of it...” She said to no one in particular, shame and guilt rolling off of her like thunder, “Can I… step outside?  _ Is _ there an outside?”

It occurred to Optimus in that moment that she didn’t have any idea where she was, if she was on Cybertron, or a ship, or another  _ planet _ . She didn’t have the chance to explore the universe like he had; but rather had spent her entire conscious life on a dying, war torn world that she no doubt still called home.

“Of course you may exit,” He answered softly, gesturing towards the door that would take her out into the warm California night, “just be wary of the organic life present, and do not stray far.” Simple and true, and did not imply in any way that she, alongside the rest of them, was effectively stranded on an alien world.

She nodded politely, optics devastatingly dull as she returned to her pedes. She refused to look at the two mechs, turning reluctantly to the exit, eerie silence lingering in her wake.

“She’s alive, after all these orns she’s really alive,” Ratchet’s voice was more reverent than he’d ever heard it, and yet so full of sadness, “she’s been through pit and back but she’s alive.”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

“Before Backtrack left the base for good, they stayed with me while she recovered,” his vents cycled shakily, “she was small, just learning to speak.”

He wasn’t sure what to say, what he  _ could  _ say. There was no protocol for this, no routine he could follow.

“Should I… go speak to her?” He asked tentatively. Ratchet nodded slowly.

“It’s probably best if she comes in before the others take notice,” he said, rubbing his servos over his faceplates with a dull scraping sound, “I need to get a space ready for her, and Primus knows none of the others know how to respect personal space.”

“I am inclined to agree with you.” He affirmed, making for the steel door through which she had exited, pedes thudding at a volume much greater than he thought they were meant to.

“Be patient with her.” Ratchet’s voice stole his attention once more, before he braced himself and fled the medbay.

Much to his displeasure, but not to any terrible amount of surprise, a small crowd had gathered just outside of the pseudo-medbay, murmurs hushing suddenly as soon as the Prime appeared. Half a dozen pairs of optics stared up at him when the door clanged shut behind him.

“What are you all doing-?”

“What in Primus’ name is going on?” Ironhide interrupted, shouldering his way to the Prime’s front, clearly unphased by his leader’s vexation, “you didn’t think to mention that a  _ femme  _ had landed?”

“She arrived on Earth only hours ago, Ironhide. It is not as if she’s been harbored here.”

“So she just  _ showed up _ ? Who even  _ is  _ she?” Sideswipe interjected at a volume much too loud for his comfort. Now distinctly irritated, Optimus took a step forward; the mechs gathered having to take one or two steps of their own back in order to accommodate. 

“ _ Maxima _ has been imprisoned and tortured by the Decepticons since the fall of Iacon, and would benefit from some peace and  _ quiet _ .” Predictably, a stunned silence greeted him, “none of you are to speak with her until Ratchet or I give the okay, do I make myself clear?” 

Nothing

“Do I make myself  _ clear _ ?” The tense quiet lingered a few moments longer, no one wanting to be the first to speak after the Prime raised his booming voice. It wasn’t until Bumblebee, bless his spark, gave a certain red mech a gentle shove, gesturing with his helm towards the bunker where the bulk of them recharged. Ironhide gave Optimus one last glance, this one full of genuine astonishment, before turning to follow the rest of the mechs who had gathered, speaking in hushed whispers as they retreated obediently.

He heaved a dramatic ex-vent, watching them disappear before making for the small silhouette that had taken refuge near the weapons storage.

_ This complicates things, doesn’t it? _

When he found her she was staring at the sky, no doubt trying to gain some sense of where in the universe she was. It was still hard to believe she was here, that she was  _ real _ . She was standing right in front of him, pedes kicking halfheartedly at the sandy ground beneath her as she swayed ever so slightly. She had walked in a straight line from the door, and was standing just past the edge of the barracks, black plating somehow managing to stand out, even in the dark of night.

She was beautiful.

“I’m sorry,” she said suddenly, clearly having long been aware of the Prime’s presence, “that wasn’t-- I’m sorry you had to see that.” 

“You needn’t apologize,” he assured, “you’ve been through a great deal.”  _ And I’ve seen much worse _ .

“I haven’t even been  _ alive  _ for half of this war,” she asserted, a curt laugh escaping her, “how can you possibly say that with a straight face?”

“I am not in the business of comparing soldiers, Maxima,” Optimus informed the small femme, “you were born into a war-torn world, one that tried to extinguish you many times; and yet here you are.”  _ Please don’t diminish yourself  _ stayed caught in his throat. She let out an exasperated ex-vent.

“I know who I am… I know what people think when they hear my name,” there was bitterness in her voice, “I know I was a symbol, a myth, the supernatural femme who defeated death.”

“You were  _ hope _ , Maxima.” He willed her to believe that, he wished she could know just how much she had meant to the Autobots, to  _ Cybertron _ . She turned to him, shaking her helm with a questioning look in her optics. 

“...What are we doing here, Optimus Prime?” She asked, voice surely only bearing the slightest hint of the turmoil raging in her spark as she finally met his carefully neutral gaze.

“What do you mean?” He knew exactly what she meant. He knew he would have to explain to her that the cause her father had fought for, that  _ she  _ had fought for was all but over. He knew that after years of being tortured and experimented on, he would have to tell her that the world as she knew it was gone. He wished he didn’t have to, he wished that he could just put a pin in it, save the pain for another day; maybe even make someone else confess to the sins that he knew belonged to him and him alone.

“Why are we here? What happened?” But he would have no such luck on this night.

“Cybertron was lost,” He wouldn’t lie to her, he wouldn’t soften the blow; he couldn’t possibly justify lying to her, “Megatron and the Decepticons disappeared… and we are in hiding, here on Earth.” It was the first time he had said it all out loud since that fateful day; when he had watched his home crumble around him, when he had realized he  _ failed _ .

For a long while she said nothing, the silence almost stifling in its weight. He had failed her, just like he had failed everyone else; that much he knew. He had failed her, just like he failed her creators, just like he failed the thousands of femmes who hadn’t survived like she had.

“Maxima?”

She collapsed to all fours, helm hanging as she appeared to shrink in on herself.

“So… we lost, we’re never going home,” he didn’t miss the way her voice shook, “everything is gone.”

It wasn’t that she seemed small, but rather weighed down. As if she had placed the entire outcome of the war on her shoulders, and he was watching her collapse under the weight of their loss.

He would give anything to convince her to share the load.

“We are alive, Maxima.  _ You  _ are alive,” He offered, resisting the urge to wrap her in embrace, to keep her from falling apart at the seams as it seemed she just might, “and right now, that is what matters.” He wasn’t sure if even  _ he  _ believed that, but she certainly didn’t.

“ _ Alive _ ,” she said the world as if it tasted foul in her mouth, “that’s the thing isn’t it? Staying alive?”

“No, it’s just a starting point,” He replied calmly, all too familiar with the act of delivering a pep talk he would never listen to, “because you can’t get back up to fight again if you’re dead on the ground.” He didn’t realize he had started to approach her until he stood at her side.

“Well, I came very close to that, didn’t I?” He kneeled beside her, she looked up at him.

“Yes, yes you did,” he agreed, placing a servo gingerly upon her shoulder, “and yet here you are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the next chapter in Maxima's perspective I'm gonna try writing from third person instead of third, just to see how it feels. I know that'll kind of make it not an xReader anymore but I just kind of feel like I can do her the most justice if I just let her be her own character.


End file.
